Rob Jarman: How I went from Sherlock's stunt double to dry stone waller

As he wanders the hills above Pateley Bridge surveying his latest piece of handiwork, Rob Jarman looks like he was born to be a dry stone waller. However, until two years ago he was leading a very different life, one which involved him being punched by Tom Hardy in The Dark Knight Rises and doubling for Benedict Cumberbatch’s Sherlock.

“It was me who jumped off that hospital building at the end of second series,” says the 36 year old former stuntman, who could dine out on countless similar stories from the time he rode a penny farthing dressed as Harry Hill’s Professor Branestawm to dodging exploding bullets on the set of War Horse.

“I grew up round here and our family had always been the adventurous sorts. By 18 I was travelling the world as a professional mountain biker, but while I was riding out in New Zealand I came off and hurt myself pretty badly. I had really burned myself out and knew then that I needed to find another career.

“I applied to the Royal Marines and set a new record on the assault course, but I had been too used to doing my own thing and realised that Armed Forces discipline wasn’t going to sit well with me so I walked away.”

That was in 2008 and when around the same the time he was introduced to a stunt co-ordinator it seemed to everyone that he had landed his dream job.

“My very first job was on Casualty. I had to drive a truck down a highway and smash it into the side of a skip. I thought, ‘Well, I’ve never been behind a wheel of a truck, but this feels awesome’.”

Other television shows like Merlin, Grantchester and Doctor Who followed and then came the call of the big screen. He was soon jetting around the world making the stars of Captain America: The First Avenger and The Awakening look good. It was an envy-making career, except things weren’t quite as billed.

“As a stuntman you have to have six specialities. As well as mountain biking I was proficient in horse riding, kayaking, scuba diving, rock climbing and motor racing, but the main qualification is ‘can you fall off stuff or be hit by stuff at high speed?’ I could, really well.

“Back home everyone thought I was having a brilliant time. I mean, not many kids who grew up here end up on the sets of blockbusters, but I wasn’t enjoying myself.”

A bust up with his boss on the set of Ridley Scott’s Prometheus signalled the end of his time in film and looking back Rob may well have already been displaying the signs of the head injuries which would ultimately put pay to his stunt career.

“I got a lot of work as I am a pretty good height and build to double for most actors,” says Rob, who stood in for Kevin Doyle when his character DS John Wadsworth jumped off the bridge in Happy Valley. “When you are doing stunts the chances are you are going to come away with a few bruises. I wasn’t fearless, but I never did anything where I felt there was a real risk of hurting myself.”

However, years of taking knocks to the head soon began to show. On one job he suffered a detached retina, the wooziness he felt following a big stunt began take longer to wear off and when he was hired to jump from a pier the worse happened.

“I had to wear a big heavy helmet,” he says. “I knew that the timing was everything and how much it hurt would depend how I hit the water. As I jumped the helmet slipped. I became disorientated, over-rotated and slapped into the sea face first.”

It took a little while for the support crew to reach him through the choppy waters by which time he suffered from what’s known as secondary drowning.

“I was taken to hospital and it was a long time before they could get my oxygen levels right. I was in a bad way, but while it sounds ridiculous to say it now, six weeks later I as back at work. It was a bit of a badge of honour, not for me, but the people I was working with. They could turn to the director and say, ‘See him, he was nearly dead a few weeks ago’.”

Looking back at that time, Rob remembers his emotions being heightened. He also openly admits that he was suffering from mood swings and was starting to become a bit reckless, refusing to take the easy path to a stunt if a more difficult one was available.

“I was really struggling being away from home,” he says. “I was out in Spain. It should have been like any other job, but after a day on set being pummelled I remember feeling really rattled. I stood on the balcony to my apartment and thought, ‘I need to stop’. My dad picked me up from the airport and when I got in the car and said ‘I can’t do it any more’. I needed to disappear for a while.”

While Rob, who had also fractured his skull when he fell from a hay barn as a child, knew that something was wrong, as he replaced the stunt work by running ultra marathons he still appeared be the picture of health. However, last summer he was sent for brain scans by his GP which confirmed that over the course of his career he had suffered multiple brain bleeds.

“My career was already over, but even if I had been entertaining thoughts of going back I couldn’t. They retired me on the spot. I’m not blaming anyone. The stunt industry is highly regulated and no one forced me to do anything I didn’t want to, but when your day job involves being hit by a car 20 times in one day something has to give. My brain just became foggy and I would react to situations very differently to how I had before. My brain was damaged and it was trying to find a different way of processing things.”

Learning the art of drystone walling has proved to be a key part of Rob’s recovery and while it might not be his forever job it has given him a new perspective on life.

“When we were kids, a friend and I used to say, ‘If all else fails we will come back here and be dry stone wallers’, so that’s what I do now. I am not fully recovered, but I am getting there. I cut everything toxic out of my life, from people to situations and now when I go out to work it’s often just me and the dog.

“Dry stone walling is still pretty physical. A lot of my work involves repairing walls which have been hit by cars and you can end up moving a ton of stone by hand. What has happened has made me enjoy the simple things of life and I do want to raise awareness of the impact of head injury trauma within sports.

“I did have a couple of big injuries, but a lot of the damaged I suffered was from repeated, small hits to the head. It’s a bit like boxing and now I have had the chance to look back I can see absolutely see that some of the guys I worked with were suffering from the same condition. When you are a stuntman, people think you are invincible. I don’t know what I will do next, but for now I’m just happy knowing that I got out when I did.”